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September 2011

From Kristin Coyner of CQ Weekly in the September 5, 2011 print edition:

After Four And A Half Years working for Barack Obama -- as chief operating officer of his campaign and in the White House as deputy assistant to the president for management and administration -- Henry De Sio has left to restart his old firm, Way Forward Strategies.

As the father of sons ages 2 and 3, De Sio says the decision came down to family. "I feel a bond with this president and also a responsibility for his organization after all these years, says De Sio, 48. "It was a very hard decision for me to make, but it was primarily motivated by family considerations."

De Sio's firm coached new political candidates and worked with labor unions before he put the organization on hold in early 2007 to work for Obama's campaign. Now he plans to help nonprofit as well as private sector organizations, especially entrepreneurs and small businesses to learn from his experiences on the campaign trail.

"There is an opportunity to take the experience of Obama for America," he says, "growing a seedling operation and nurturing that and then scaling it into what was the near equivalent of a Fortune 1,000 Company and all the challenges that go with that."